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Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

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Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#261

Post by pdimitar »

UweSchmidt wrote: post #257
pdimitar wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Definitely not on me but I know people for whom that applies, yeah.

I'm changing that to: Propaganda works and there is little defense. Pictures, voices, narratives, emotions directly create memories; connections between neurons are created or strenghtened - you can switch on your "anti virus" but the machine is hacked on the "hardware" level.

I agree. Our instinctive reaction is to believe all the subliminal messaging. And we have to actively and consciously resist believing it, and to undo the wrong beliefs.

But it also helps a lot to periodically read how yet another US teacher is living in their car. After a while it becomes an instinct NOT to believe the propaganda that tells you otherwise.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#262

Post by scotty79 »

fsloth wrote: post #104
prmoustache wrote: post #20

I cringe every time I hear the US president being described as the leader of the free world, as if there were 2 specific sides and USA were leading it and as if USA was an advocate for freedom.

USA is an advocate of very specific stability. "Free world" is a hyperbolic but US is still a huge global power. In cold war it was obvious there were two sides, and the other was obviously more free than the other. Go ask for example Estonians, Lithuanians or Latvians who they enjoyed the yoke of the USSR. Now, as China is becoming an ever more stronger player, we again see that there are two sides arising. While pa…

> In cold war it was obvious there were two sides ...

These two sides narration was a very intentional American construct. View from the other side wasn't symmetrical. US as seen from the other side was just seen as a powerful country that likes to mess around with other countries business exploiting them for their own purposes.

End of cold war changed nothing. US is still a powerful country that likes to mess around the world to exploit it better, and Russia is still insular country that doesn't want to allow any of that on their turf.

The only thing that changed with the end of the cold war was that US could no longer credibly spin the narrative that Russia wants to take over the world and turn Texans into communists.

Fortunately, after a bit of mucking around USA could brand terrorists as their global super dangerous enemy and business could continue as usual.

Currently when terrorists turned out to be a very limited threat and USA proved to be very incompetent at fighting them long term, USA again began shopping for a narrative enemy. Obvious choice is China, but USA leaders with more than two brain cells are little hesitant about that, because you don't necessarily want to frame yourself as enemy of someone who could very likely seriously eff you up.

We'll see how it all unfolds.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#264

Post by throwawaylinux »

Retric wrote: post #260
throwawaylinux wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

Hollywood is not some united single entity. I’ve seen some powerful anti gun movies, and movies that treat them like a fetish. At the end of the day it’s a business and it’s more profitable to make movies people want to see. Be that Saw - for some people or Barney's Great Adventure for a different audience.

Fortunately my question is not predicated on Hollywood being some united single entity so the question is trivial to answer in good faith if you want to.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#265

Post by gnmla »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #209
elefanten wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Would love to know what this means. You saying you’re completely baffled by this term, or asking for the poster’s particular meaning? I’d draw a parallel to “White supremacy”. Given the wild range of applications for the term, you need to get a sense of what any one wielder really means. But it’d be quite obtuse to reply “what’s White supremacy?”

White supremacy is the belief that white people and whiteness should hold power over black and brown people. No one in my social circles uses “wokeness” at all, certainly never seriously. It always seems like people upset at “wokeness” are actually just upset that people producing popular media support very simple concepts of diversity. Like when black actors get representation in media previously dominated by white…

No post body was provided.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#266

Post by walterbell »

mulmen wrote: post #166
34679 wrote: post #121

>The film also notes that the United States has laws against propagandizing the U.S. public, which might make such a disclosure a confession of a crime. I would add that since 1976, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights has required that “Any propaganda for war shall be prohibited by law.” That changed in 2013: >The U.S. government's mammoth broadcasting arm has begun the "unleashing of thousands o…

Ok so war propaganda is illegal but what changed in 2013? Did the laws change or did we just stop caring to enforce them?

U.S. legalization of propaganda lead to an industrial-scale "grassroots PR" industry for use by any buyer in the "nudge" market, including a sizable subset of the global Fortune 500. This industry has since been active in online venues with meaningful audiences, http://www.techsoc.com/grassroots.html & https://twitter.com/evoleadership/status/761959456624082944

2010 paper made a case for Smith-Mundt act changes, https://web.archive.org/web/20220107123332/https://www.hsdl....

> The cyber world will progressively become both a boon and a bane to IO personnel, allowing them to reach a global audience, but also providing a large vulnerability to enemy deception and PSYOP efforts that will require a near immediate response to worldwide, operational events .. Update US Influence Operations doctrine to .. develop TTPs for employing PSYOP, MILDEC, and Public Affairs using the new cyber technology. Once developed, the TTPs must .. allow the military IO operator an avenue for developing proficiency in the release of “precision guided messages” to foreign audiences.

2018 analysis, https://web.archive.org/web/20180720063648if_/http://reposit...

> ..government bureaucracy advanced measures aimed at controlling the global online environment. Commercial companies further exploited their geographical flexibility, minimal accountability and ‘black boxed’ practises, to profit from this desire to side-step awkward bureaucracy designed to protect the public ... the ‘merging’ of PSYOP and PA raised concern in academia and beyond ... This article engages in deep exploration of struggles between subfields of propaganda. It shows how PSYOP and Information Operations (IO) personnel struggled against Public Affairs over the adaptation of systems..

Other search terms:

   Information Operations (IO)
   Influence Operations (IO)
   Inform and Influence Activities (IIA)
   Interactive Internet Activities (IIA)

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#267

Post by Retric »

throwawaylinux wrote: post #264
Retric wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hollywood is not some united single entity. I’ve seen some powerful anti gun movies, and movies that treat them like a fetish. At the end of the day it’s a business and it’s more profitable to make movies people want to see. Be that Saw - for some people or Barney's Great Adventure for a different audience.

Fortunately my question is not predicated on Hollywood being some united single entity so the question is trivial to answer in good faith if you want to.

Ok, then trivially the answer is no.

There is nothing hypocritical about denouncing A while someone else does X.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#268

Post by raverbashing »

34679 wrote: post #121

>The film also notes that the United States has laws against propagandizing the U.S. public, which might make such a disclosure a confession of a crime. I would add that since 1976, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights has required that “Any propaganda for war shall be prohibited by law.” That changed in 2013: >The U.S. government's mammoth broadcasting arm has begun the "unleashing of thousands o…

However, that act didn't seem to have an effect in publishing media like: Top Gun movies and the America's Army videogame.

Not sure how the VoA programming looks like (sounds like I guess) but I don't think outlets for government promotion were lacking even before the act was overturned

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#269

Post by naniwaduni »

atq2119 wrote: post #199
aaaaaaaaaaab wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It is simply unimaginable. WWII being the fight of good versus evil is the foundation myth of post-1945 western civilization. It is the central dogma of the western pseudo-religion, which prevents meaningful discussion of these matters.

Eh, I'd say the Holocaust makes a good argument in favour of it genuinely being a good vs evil thing. I mean, that certainly wasn't the only (or even main) motivation, but come on. The actual myth is that the West is/was systematically engaged on the good side in good vs evil conflicts, when in reality WWII was more of an exception in that regard.

The "West" was ... not exactly on one side of WWII. It had, after all, factions on all sides of WWII. It is not the "West" as a whole that tells that myth.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#270

Post by throwawaylinux »

Retric wrote: post #267
throwawaylinux wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fortunately my question is not predicated on Hollywood being some united single entity so the question is trivial to answer in good faith if you want to.

Ok, then trivially the answer is no. There is nothing hypocritical about denouncing A while someone else does X.

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